Venk Reddy, CIO of Sustainable Credit, and Marcus Moore, Assistant Portfolio Manager, provided a behind-the-scenes look at how sustainability factors impact creditworthiness and how you, as a fixed income investor, can make a difference with your capital.
We believe effective ESG integration into the credit research process is essential for a truly sustainable portfolio. In our view, a creditworthy business operates in a long-term sustainable way. We view contaminated land, employee safety claims, or an unfunded pension liability through the same lens as we evaluate financial risks such as leverage, cash flows, and liquidity. This effort is fundamental to our investment process and differentiates us from traditional ESG — it is not an overlay, a screen, or an after-the-fact green wash.
We evaluate companies on our proprietary Sustainability Spectrum®, track them in our proprietary GreenSlateTM software and engage them directly to discuss opportunities for improvement. A creditworthy issuer may be one with sustainable strength relative to peers or one that is making visible progress toward appropriate sustainable practices, and we take our role in that progress seriously. Our dependable approach to credit investing ensures that every holding in our portfolio is proactively selected to meet both our fundamental and sustainability standards.
The stages of the Sustainability Spectrum® are: Awareness, Strategy, Execution, and Measurement. Using the Sustainability Spectrum® assists in identifying companies that are leaders in their sectors in key areas of sustainable business practices or who are making or are likely to make visible progress toward appropriate sustainable practices. Our repeatable approach to credit investing means every holding is proactively selected to meet our fundamental standards, which includes sustainable business practices.
We regularly publish Sustainability Profiles on current holdings, which demonstrate how we evaluate companies as it relates to sustainability factors. Please visit our library of present and past company examples from over the years.
Venk Reddy joined Osterweis Capital Management in 2022 as part of the Zeo Capital Advisors team transition. Prior to founding Zeo Capital in 2009, Mr. Reddy was a co-founder of Laurel Ridge Asset Management, a multi-strategy hedge fund, where he managed the credit, distressed, and event-driven portfolios. Previously, he structured derivative products and was head of delta-one trading as a portfolio manager within Bank of America’s Equity Financial Products group (EFP). Mr. Reddy also managed investments in event-driven situations, convertible instruments, and options at Pine River Capital Management and HBK Investments, where he started his career.
Mr. Reddy is a principal of the firm and a Portfolio Manager for the sustainable credit strategies. He is also a portfolio manager for the growth & income and flexible balanced strategies.
He currently serves as a Trustee of Lick-Wilmerding High School in San Francisco. He previously served as a Trustee and officer of the Katherine Delmar Burke School in San Francisco.
Mr. Reddy graduated from Harvard University (B.A. in Computer Science with Honors).
Marcus Moore joined Osterweis Capital Management in 2022 as part of the Zeo Capital Advisors team transition, where he was an Assistant Portfolio Manager focused on credit research, including sustainability analysis. Before joining Zeo in 2019, Mr. Moore worked at Wells Fargo Bank for 14 years as an Analyst within Principal Investing, responsible for the retail, consumer, and gaming sectors across various asset classes including high yield bonds, leveraged loans, and structured products. Prior to working at Wells Fargo, Mr. Moore worked at Edison Mission Energy as an analyst and at Hamilton Resources, Procter & Gamble, and Goldman Sachs.
He is an Assistant Portfolio Manager for the sustainable credit strategies.
Mr. Moore graduated from Morgan State University in Baltimore, MD (B.S. in Accounting) and from the University of California, Los Angeles Anderson School with an M.B.A. He also holds the CPA designation.
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